Month: August 2018

Using the Bureau of Land Management Website and the BLM Tract Books

Federal land records can be a valuable source for genealogical information. This presentation discusses searching the BLM website for patentees and warrantees, creating effective searches, wildcard searches, and geographic based searches. Not all individuals who received or obtained federal land were early settlers. There were states in the federal domain where federal land was being […]

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Kith and Kin In Jackson Township

Every so often a document reminds me of the importance of neighbors–even when the family’s origins are fairly well documented and the “analyze the neighbors” approach is not really necessary to figure them out. The 1830 census for Jackson Township in Coshocton County, Ohio, contains Christianna (DeMoss) Rampley. By the time of this enumeration, Christianna […]

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Do You Need to Match the Edges?

Digital images of original documents can sometimes be a little confusing when it’s not clear what front goes with what back. That’s what happened when I was working with a homestead application contained in the  “Nebraska, Homestead, Records, 1861-1936,”at Ancestry.com. The original item of interest was an 1872 relinquishment by John H. Aden in the homestead application […]

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Back of a Federal Land Patent

This image comes from the back of a Federal Land Patent. It was issued based on a War of 1812 military land warrant that was issued to Agusta Newman based upon his service in the War of 1812 from Bourbon County, Kentucky. Agusta lived in White County, Indiana, at the time of his application and, […]

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Clashing over Clasha Rampley

Transcriptions like this make me wonder about Ancestry.com. (We’ve discussed this before in “How does Ancestry.com See?“) I’ve seen the last name of Rampley written quite a few ways. I don’t ever remember it looking like Ancestry.com does in this 1810 census from Connecticut. If I had to throw out a quick guess, I would say that […]

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How “New” Is that Database, Really?

There’s always something “new” in genealogyland–at least according to the number of times the word “new” appears within my line of site with either the word “website” or “database” attached to it. The emails, Facebook posts, twitter updates, etc. fly across my computer screen like so many gnats. The problem is that what’s “new” may […]

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Forgetting Agusta’s Siblings

Sometimes it can be so easy to forget. I’ve recently gotten new copies of the War of 1812 Bounty Land Warrant Application file for Agusta Newman who enlisted in a unit from Bourbon County, Kentucky, in 1814. A quick review of the pages confirmed what I thought I remembered: no other family members are mentioned. […]

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